UVic Softball Clinches First Regular Season Title

A softball team poses in orange shirts on a softball field. — Team Victoria during the final week of the 2026 regular season.

There’s a moment in every special season where a team stops just playing well and starts playing free. Loose, locked-in, and clearly enjoying every second of it. For the University of Victoria softball team, that moment arrived this weekend, and it couldn’t have come at a better time.

Victoria came in tied atop the standings with UBC Okanagan, with the two teams set to play each other twice over the course of the weekend along with games against Regina and Saskatchewan. By Sunday night, the Vikes had settled the question themselves — clinching the program’s first regular season championship in its history, and with it, an automatic bid to the 2027 CCSA National Championship.

Friday

The weekend didn’t start the way the script called for. UBC Okanagan took the opener 6-4 at Centennial Field, riding a five-run swing across the third, fourth and fifth innings. Madeleine Moon gave Victoria an early spark with a solo homer in the second, and Celina Bhatti added a two-run shot in the sixth to make it interesting, but UBCO’s bottom-of-the-order production proved to be too much.

Saturday

Victoria played three games on Saturday and won all three, outscoring opponents by a combined 25-1.

The day opened with a 9-0 run-rule win over Regina, built on a six-run first inning. Bhatti delivered again, doubling in three runs, while Kassidy Ralfs cruised through five scoreless innings in the circle. Madison Hillman, who was quietly building toward one of the best weekends of her career, went 3-for-3 from the leadoff spot.

Victoria didn’t let up in game two, blitzing Regina 12-1 behind Hillman’s leadoff home run and a three-hit, eight-strikeout performance from Addison Barton. Hillman finished the game 3-for-4, and Victoria Perry and Lauren Parsons combined for six RBIs out of the middle of the order.

Then came the rematch with UBC Okanagan, with the title race still very much alive. This time, Victoria answered. Kaitlyn Penner threw a complete-game shutout, and Perry’s two-run double in the fifth was all the offense the Vikes would need in a 4-0 win. It was elite softball from the league’s two best teams, with everything on the line.

Sunday

With momentum fully in hand, Victoria hosted Saskatchewan for a doubleheader and never trailed for long. Kristen Bertelsen‘s RBI single and a three-run homer powered a 5-1 win in game one, with Hudsyn Milne going the distance in the circle.

Game two turned into a wild, back-and-forth slugfest. Saskatchewan clawed back from an early deficit with a seven-run fifth inning to take a 9-7 lead. Victoria didn’t blink. An eight-run sixth inning, fueled by extra-base hits from Ella Geyssen, Perry, and Hillman, put the game away 15-9. Perry capped a huge individual weekend with three more hits, and Bhatti added four hits of her own in the finale.

Five wins in six games, with two against the other #1 team, with the title on the line…that’s about as good a case as a team can make for itself.

But talk to anyone around the program this year, and the record almost feels like a footnote to what’s happening in that dugout. Head coach Lori Zehr said earlier in the season she liked what she was seeing from her group’s energy, and this weekend was that observation on full display. This is a team that is clearly enjoying each other. They are playing with the kind of loose, connected energy that is reflected on the scoreboard. Whatever chemistry has been building all year is translating into some of the best softball this program has ever played, and it’s rightfully put them at the top of the league.

What’s Next

Winning the regular season title locks up Victoria’s spot at the 2027 CCSA National Championship, but the postseason is far from a formality. The WCSA title itself is still up for grabs, along with the remaining bids to 2027 nationals for everyone else in the league. And beyond the bids, there’s still real hardware on the line with teams jockeying for a spot on the WCSA medal stand next weekend.

Victoria’s national bid is punched. Everything else — the title, the medals, the other 2027 CCSA bids — is still TBD.